Dear Supporters:
Today on the Democracy Now podcast, former federal district court judge and Peltier pro bono attorney Kevin H. Sharp, was interviewed by Amy Goodman.
Mr. Sharp made a number of claims about Peltier's conviction that need to be addressed and corrected.
What follows is a comment posted regarding Mr. Sharp's public statements. (More to follow)
“Judge” Kevin Sharp is grossly misrepresenting the record of Peltier’s conviction by inappropriately claiming that the ‘standards are different.’ Nonsense.
Sharp, by referencing Myrtle Poor Bear without acknowledging that she never testified, and that Peltier’s own attorney characterized her as a “…witness whose mental imbalance is so gross as to render her testimony unbelievable,” only plays right into the Peltier narrative. Sharp alleges that ballistics evidence was withheld from the defense, and then ignores the 1985 three-day evidentiary (ballistics) hearing and that the 8th Circuit reviewed the entire matter concluding “When all is said and done, however, a few simple but very important facts remain. The casing introduced into evidence had in fact been extracted from the Wichita AR-15. This point was not disputed...” and, “the trial witnesses unanimously testified that there was only one AR-15 in the compound prior to the murders, that this weapon was used exclusively by Peltier and carried out by Peltier after the murders.” (The Poor Bear affidavits were used regarding Peltier’s extradition. However, the Canadian Government, in 1999 was unambiguous, that “…Mr. Peltier was lawfully extradited to the United States,” “…the circumstantial evidence presented at the extradition hearing, taken alone, constituted sufficient evidence to justify Mr. Peltier’s committal on the two murder charges.”) Among many of Sharp’s misrepresentations is the wholly inaccurate claim that the government somehow changed its prosecution theory to one of Aiding and Abetting, again, ignoring the basic record that Peltier was indicted on November, 17, 1975 for murder and Aiding and Abetting, warrants were issued based on those charges, and within the Peltier trial transcript {4874 – 5164} the defense and prosecution discussed with the judge, jury instructions on Aiding and Abetting and that it was also included in the government’s closing argument. Sharp’s fatally flawed claim of ‘different standards’ collapses with one of the many appellate decisions from as late as 2003; “Previous federal court decisions provided the (parole) Commission with ample facts to support its conviction that Peltier personally shot Agents Coler and Williams.” “Neither the conviction nor any of the subsequent court decisions have been overturned.” (10th Circuit Court of Appeals, 1/4/2003). Sharp’s pro bono support of Peltier is admirable; he can be respected for that, but in the process, being a former federal judge and an attorney, he has to accurately assess the facts. Otherwise, it’s just more noise from the Peltier camp, and there would be much more to comment on Mr. Sharp’s public statement.
"In the Spirit of Coler and Williams"
Ed
